When Father Is Away
by Mononoke-hime x sukai kurora
Summary: Uchiha Sarada thought boys were stupid, but annoyance wasn't the reason. Spoilers for chapter 700.


_When Father Is Away_

Uchiha Sarada observed silently as Boruto Uzumaki coated the faces of the Hokage with face paint. Her dark eyes looked down at him as he shouted. _"I hate the Hokage!" _Anger burned in her stomach. _What a fool,_ Sarada thought as she stared at the Hokage faces. Although only six, Sarada understood the words that Boruto had painted on his father's face. _Shitty father. _Sarada understood her classmate's pain. She could understand the loneliness in Boruto's eyes when their classmate's fathers came to pick them up from the Academy or when they arrived to find their father not home. Sarada remembered Boruto loudly proclaiming in the classroom during the first day of the Academy that he hated the fact that his father wasn't by his side during the entrance ceremony.

The current Hokage had been addressing all of the other students as he stood in the center, ignoring or not noticing his son's resentful stares. Sarada too remembered that day because her own father had been beside her. She hadn't been in his presence in such an extended period of time that she didn't know how to react around him. A couple days later had left, and Sarada hadn't seen him since.

Boruto didn't seem to understand his father or of the Hokage positon that much. Sarada only knew bits and pieces, but it seemed that Boruto's father had been shunned and incredibly lonely during his childhood. Her mother had gently explained. _"The Hokage had no one to care for him when he was young, and so he wanted to become Hokage to be acknowledged." _ A wistful smile appeared on her face. _"Then as he grew older he simply wanted to protect the people he cared about. Boruto-_kun _will understand someday." _Sarada wondered if his father or mother had attempted to explain why Boruto's father was absent from his life. Did they simply believe he would understand someday, or did they not want to burden their son with his father's troubled past? Sarada didn't know. She herself only understood limited information about her own father.

As a very young child, Sarada didn't understand why her father would disappear from her sight for a couple months and then return again for a month or two. Once when she had locked herself in her room crying and shouting that she hated her father, her mother had embraced her and stroked her hair before explaining why her father did what he did. _"Your father was hurt very much when he was young. He was so hurt that he closed his heart off to everyone." _Sarada remembered her mother's thoughtful gaze became saddened. _"He did some terrible things, Sarada, because of that pain…and he doesn't feel like he should be forgiven for what he did." _

Sarada felt her mother's tears against her small cheeks when she said, _"But I don't care what he did."_

_ "You didn't know him back then sweetheart," _her mother whispered softly. _"He was a broken man back then, and he doesn't feel as if he should be forgiven. That's why he doesn't often stay, you see? He travels the world, helping people, trying to make up for what he had done in the past."_

Sarada hadn't understood much of what her mother had told her at that time, but now that she was older, she understood what her mother was saying. Her father had a past that no one she knew talked about, and her father was ashamed of it. Although years had passed since the conversation with her mother, Sarada wasn't ashamed of her father. She wished that he could see that.

Like her own father, Boruto's father wasn't around much in his life. They both had near yet far relationships with their fathers, and yet…

He was a fool.

Boruto didn't understand that his father cared for him despite of all the time he spent on his position as Hokage. Sarada remembered when late at night she heard the Hokage sobbing to her mother that Boruto ignored him every time when he came home. Boruto no longer ignored his father, but there was a slight tension there whenever someone mentioned of how wonderful the Hokage was, or when he was called Honorable Son. Sarada had her own relationship issues with her father. She acknowledged that. Unlike before when she wouldn't met his eyes or ignore him as Boruto had once done, Sarada smiled around him and took in every second she had with her father. She only understood bits and pieces of why her father went away so much, but someday she hoped to find out the truth. Boruto was different.

He simply didn't cherish the moments with his father because he wasn't with him as he thought he should be.

_Something could happen to him, Boruto, and then you would never have your father. _Sarada observed from above as she watched Boruto and the Hokage clean the faces on the Monument. _Let go of your resentment and start talking to him again. _A memory of when they were very young appeared in her mind. She and her future classmate had only been toddlers, but she remembered of how happy Boruto was around his father back then, and of how proud of him he was. _I was that way too around my own father. It's not the same now, but…I hope to reach him again. _Sarada's fists clenched as she watched as Boruto scowled as his father teleported away. _I want you to stop being a fool. _For a couple of moments, Sarada watched as Boruto continued to scowl before he walked away from the mountain. She closed her eyes and thought of her own father.

_Otōchan…toki ni anata ga ie ni…kite iru?_

"I miss you, _Otōchan_," Sarada whispered. Silently she stood, thinking about happy memories with her father.


End file.
